Might does not make right. The only possible source for moral authority for government comes from it acknowledging and submitting to Christ as King and Lord. But as this country has rejected Christ, its only claim to authority comes from the barrel of a gun–from threatening violence against those who don’t obey.
Sadly, even reformed Christians are taking part in this. Below is a conversation on a Facebook group of reformed Christians. I wonder what it’s like to enforce the unjust, unconstitutional laws of a nation under God’s judgment. The following comes from a friendly conversation where a guy asked the group what tool people use most often at their job. A lot of people named various tools and testing equipment or computers. A lot of pastors said they use the Bible most. Out of a couple hundred responses I saw two cops say they used their gun most.
Here’s the rest of that conversation.
The founding fathers declared their independence because the standing army the king placed in the colonies. But we just put up with people like Andrew being willing to kill those who might run a stop sign, smoke in a public place or not pay their taxes.
Folks, don’t make foolish mistakes. If you think that a sheriff who supports private gun ownership is “pro-Second-Amendment” because “people should be safe,” you don’t understand reality, and you don’t understand the Second Amendment.
Reality check: The purpose of the Second Amendment was NOT to give safety to individual citizens against criminals. That has never been the point, and has never even crossed the mind of the Framers to establish that as a special right. The purpose of the Second Amendment was to DENY SAFETY TO GOVERNMENT AGENTS against individual citizens, when those government agents cross the line.
Thus, when a sheriff says you should have a gun to defend yourself against criminals, he is still not “pro-Second Amendment.” He will be “pro-Second-Amendment” only when he says that YOU SHOULD HAVE A GUN TO SHOOT COPS WHEN THEY BREAK THE LAW. This was the specific purpose of the Second Amendment, and if a Sheriff doesn’t say it explicitly, he is NOT “pro-Second-Amendment.”
So be wise and informed, and don’t fall for statist propaganda, even if it comes from your local beloved Sheriff.
The following is taken from page 127 of “Government Indicted” by Marc Stevens.
“But taxes are the life-blood of government, and their prompt and certain availability an imperious need.” Bull v. United States, 295 U.S. 247; 55 S. Ct. 695; 79 L. Ed. 1421 (1935).
This idea is constantly reinforced. You’ll get notices from tax agencies about all the good things done with taxes, e.g., infrastructure, social security, aid to Israel, tsunami relief, etc. You then have two political parties relentlessly arguing about what the booty should be used for: conservatives argue the booty should go to law enforcement and the military, and liberals argue it should be for welfare and other social programs.
We fall for this and start arguing with one of the sides, even campaigning for the lesser of the two evils so the booty will be spent wisely. We also vote, which again reinforces the bond caused by the trauma of being controlled, manipulated, lied to, threatened and robbed. It reinforces the idea that we are somehow connected to the abusers; after all, we voted for the president and congress.
Let’s compare this frank admission from John Marshall, a supreme
court attorney and famous Mason, to the Bull quote above:
“That the power to tax involves the power to destroy;” McCulloch v. Maryland, 4 Wheat. (17 U.S.) 316, 4 L.Ed. 579
(1819).
“But taxes are the life-blood of government, and their prompt
and certain availability an imperious need.” Bull v. United States, 295 U.S. 247, 259; 55 S. Ct. 695; 79 L. Ed. 1421 (1935).
Let me get this straight: the “life-blood of government” is the “power
to destroy.” Nice admission; always good to see the occasional honesty from a gang of madmen.
Cop-worshipers often acknowledge that there are a few bad cops, just like there are a few bad doctors, construction workers, car salesmen, barbers, etc. I’ve never thought to ask what percentage they would admit are bad apples, but I’m going to guess they’d admit 1% of cops are bad.
That would mean that potentially 1% of citizen contacts could be bad. But even then, it’s not like that 1 cop in 100 goes through his day having only bad interactions. A bad cop can give a lot of unjust, illegal orders, and if people just do what he says, he gets his power trip, and nothing ever comes of that interaction. I would guess that happens a lot, and a bad cop could go a long time without really running into someone that causes him to flip out and show his true colors.
Let’s say a bad cop has one bad interaction every 2 years, meaning a lawsuit against him is filed or he gets some sort of reprimand in his file. Let’s say the average cop has 2 citizen contacts per day (to be conservative). There are 250 working days per year (52 weeks per year minus two weeks vacation). That would be 250 x 2 interactions per year, or 500. We’re assuming he can go two years without an incident, which would be 1 incident every 1000 contacts (as an estimate).
Working as a pair, it would only be 1 in 10,000 pairs of cops that are bad (.01²). Let’s assume a pair of cops still averages 2 citizen contacts per day. Out of these 10,000 pairs of cops, there is one bad pair. These 10,000 pairs have 2 contacts per day and work 250 days per year. They’re having 5 million contacts per year. And the bad pair still has an incident once every 2 years. So that means, 1 in 10 million contacts with bad pairs would have an issue arise.
This video says there are 53 million citizen contacts per year in this country. That means there ought to be about 5.3 issues per year with bad pairs of cops.
I realize I’ve made a lot of estimates and assumptions, but the problem is that I’ve posted many, many videos on this blog of bad pairs of cops, bad trios and more. Here are a couple more.
This guy was just videotaping, and 3 cops beat him, pepper sprayed him and tried to smash his phone. He’s suing them, and named them in the lawsuit. The odds of having 3 bad cops teamed up would be 1 in a million (.01³). That’s not even considering all the other cops that were present who didn’t lift a finger.
The guy in the video below was clearly not being confrontational, yet ended up having to be taken to the hospital, because a psycho nutjob cop came along. If this one guy was in the bottom 1% of cops and all the rest are good, why didn’t they stop this guy from abusing the citizen? There were at least two additional cops that showed up while the bad cop was abusing this guy. Not only that, but the Arlington PD said the force was justified in this case. Did you read that? Higher-up cops said the psycho nutjob did nothing wrong. Clearly, believing only 1% of cops are bad apples is preposterous.
Let’s say 2 higher-up cops reviewed this incident, and said the cop behaved the way a cop ought to behave. What are the odds that a psycho nutjob like this is cleared of any wrongdoing? Let’s say it’s 25% of the time. (75% of such incidents lead to consequences) That would mean that 63% of cops are also psycho nutjobs (.63³ = .25). 63% of cops being bad apples isn’t a few bad apples.
Even if you wanted to say that the odds of this psycho nutjob’s behavior being approved is 1%. (That is you think 99% of cops behaving like this guy face consequences, and I’d say you’re in lala land). You’re still saying that 22% of cops are bad. One out of five isn’t just a few bad apples. (Verify this for yourself by punching this into your calculator: .22 x .22 x .22. You’ll get about 1%.)
And I’ve shown an incident in the past where 50 or so cops abused people, and such incidents happened repeatedly in that era, and are still common today in different contexts. At that point, you’d have to admit that either the vast majority are bad, or there is some psychological thing that causes decent people to behave badly in big groups or that the whole system is broken. I don’t really care what the answer is, but it’s just clear to me that we should abolish the police.
He was a passenger in a car where the driver was pulled over. He did nothing wrong and stood up for himself. He was arrested and later released with no charges.
At 2:35 he says, “The Lord rebuke you.” All cops and all government officials from top to bottom need to hear that!
On one hand, I might scoff at anyone who raises the specter of Americans having their guns confiscated or being moved into a FEMA concentration camp. On the other hand, gun confiscation has already taken place on a limited scale as you can see in the video below. And Japanese Americans were put into concentration camps during WWII.
A couple of points I’d like to make about the video. I know people who claim that an overwhelming majority of cops are great, freedom-loving Americans who would never in a million years confiscate anyone’s guns. On the other hand, when it comes down to it, there is no shortage of cops willing to confiscate guns. It’s not bikers who will confiscate guns, or crackheads or Mexican drug cartels or inner-city gangs.
If there is ever a gun confiscation or mass internment into concentration camps, it will be Mr. local sheriff’s deputy or police officer. George Soros, Obama, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, or Harry Reid won’t be confiscating anyone’s guns.
I would hope many cops will refuse to obey such orders or enforce unjust laws, but there is ZERO evidence that any of them are willing to disobey orders. And, they certainly aren’t building up any spine in refusing to enforce unjust laws and orders now. They seem to be doing exactly what they’re told. It seems to be a human tendency to talk big about the bold, decisive actions we’ll take on the hill worth dying on until we get there. Cops are no exception.
My second point is that when the cops ask if you have a gun, it is not in your best interest to answer the question. You have no obligation to answer any question from the police. Whether you refuse to answer, or lie is something I will leave between you and the Lord, but I can think of two examples of people who have lied to government in Scripture and ended up in the Faith Hall of Fame of Hebrews 11.
I admit that it might cause problems to refuse to answer questions from police, but how much worse could it be than telling the truth like the people in this video did? We need to all get in the habit and get the gumption up to tell cops that we don’t answer their questions.
When your religion is statism and cops are the priests, apparently it can make you see things that aren’t there. Here’s a conversation I had on Twitter.
“Morality is Freedom” says that Tamir Rice approached the police. I have no idea how he came to that conclusion. As far as I can tell it is just a complete perversion of the facts. The cops raced up to him, driving on the grass, and killed the kid in under 3 seconds. I don’t see how anyone can reasonably perceive that a pedestrian has done any significant approaching in 3 seconds to a car that has just raced up to him.
Jesus said, “Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). Wouldn’t love dictate that the cop, even at the risk of his own life, at least try to diffuse the situation? Is officer safety really the chief concern? Wasn’t Jesus saying that my own well-being isn’t my chief concern?
Apparently officer safety is the chief concern, to the point that we no longer care what the Bible says about murder. The Bible teaches that humans are created in God’s image and there are very specific limits to when killing isn’t murder.
But Americans don’t care about all that. We’d rather a child be murdered, than an officer have to risk his life. Since that’s the case, wouldn’t police be even safer if they didn’t have to expose themselves at all? Shouldn’t they have just run the kid over? Maybe someone will invent special bumpers that will more effectively kill people on the first attempt at running over, so as not to give them a chance to fire on police even after having been run over by a less-lethal bumper.
In case you missed it all, here’s the video of the incident. The murder takes place beginning at the 8:26 mark.
Without this video, these cops would never have faced any serious questions about the murder they committed. But this commenter, Sheva Meucci may be on to something. He thinks they may have been trying to plant a gun on the guy. Here’s the video, and his commentary below.
1:11 When officer 1 was shot, the victims right arm was visible holding the fence at an angle that suggests a nearly impossible angle for him to left-hand-shoot the officer behind and to his left. (seriously, try it out)
Just after shooting his partner, officer 2 seems to mumble something. Perhaps it was “I didn’t mean to get you”
1:30 is the KEY
At exactly 1:30 officer 1 has just said “Where’s the gun” (fearing there never was one) pulls a secondary weapon out of his belt in the front after touching and deciding not to plant his primary weapon, then wipes it across the victim’s back and puts it on the ground (for those watching). He then picks it back up resting his weight on it barrel pointing toward the ground. The camera loses track but picks back up as the cop, with planted weapon in hand goes for his primary weapon and has to drop the planted gun to free his hand. He loosens his primary wepon but does not take it. (because the guy is obviously no threat) Then the other offficer (2) shoots the guy once.
Officer 1 then pulls out his primary weapon and shoots the victim in the back three times. He then pleads to the crowd over his murder saying “I got shot” and adjusts the position of the planted gun for the onlookers. At 2:51 he decides to call attention to the gun again by picking it up and tossing it 1 additional foot away from the dying man.
At 3:15 someone in the crowd says “He’s got another gun or what?” trying to determine why they are suffocating the dying man. At 3:16-17 officer 2 says to officer 1 “I dunno if he has a gun”
Immediately thereafter at 3:20 Officer 1 grabs his secondary weapon/plant off the ground and sticks it back in his belt as, apparently, there is some confusion about whether or not he needs a plant.
At 3:37-41 the obviously weird motions of officer 1’s body are a puposeful attempt to secretly shake loose the gun he has in his belt. (Sort of an impromptu magic trick) And it then lands on officer 2’s leg.
At 3:52 officer 1 lifts the victims left arm for cuffs and brushes his hand against the planted gun to attempt to get prints on it, even using the hand to “throw the weapon” to the side.
3:59 officer 1 has now grabbed the planted gun and moved it into a position where people on the other side of he street can see it and then asks “Does he have another one?” (desperately hoping they don’t need the plant)
4:07 Officer 2 reveals he’s not aware of the plant at this point by replying “Doesn’t really matter” intimating that they are covered for all misconduct now that they’ve found a gun and the guy is no threat even if he had another.
After displaying the second plant to everyone, officer 2 sends officer 1 away and at 4:20 yells, “That’s his fucking gun”
At 1:30 it is obvious where that weapon comes from unless it was a hover-gun.
The murderer says “Where’s the gun” reaches right for it and then pulls it out without telling his partner?
Crystal… Freaking… Clear…
Officer 2 was a violent monster using deadly force without any real danger to his life who shot his own partner, then quitely shoots the victim again with no reason to do so other than to subdue and hide his first mistake but eventually he felt he could get away with it because a gun was found.
Officer 1 may have thought the victim actually shot him, but was filled with rage at what he percieved was his attempted murder, and in his pained and blind rage became the true murderer. Then in his fear, he tried to hide his rage/fear-filled actions through planting a gun.
Officer 2 caused the whole thing and the pain and rage of officer 1 almost excuses (what he thought was) his retaliatory murder. Officer 2’s actions were just cold and evil.
I love how these abolitionists speak to the cops and call them to repentance.
I don’t think preaching is a violation of a disorderly conduct law unless the law specifies a decibel level, and the cops test the sound level with a decibel meter at a certain distance. None of that took place in this instance. Also, how can this interfere with students leaving school and getting on buses? It’s not like the kids were in class.
It boils down to the fact that these cops sinned. I bet a good percentage of them claim to be Christians and attend church. They should be placed under church discipline for this.
Abortionists rest easy at night knowing there are no good cops.
This is a video of the unjust arrest of Tatsuo Akamine in February 2015 in Torrance California. Seeing the arrest is shocking. What is even more shocking is the warped commentary on this video from Tony Miano, which you can read in full here. Tony is a retired LA Sheriff’s deputy and a street preacher. Brevity is not the soul of wit in Tony’s world, so here are the highlights of his article along with my own comments.
Tony says,
“The moment Tatsuo refused to show his identification to the officer, he was subject to arrest. The officer was not required to ask Tatsuo more than once for his identification. The officer was under no obligation whatsoever to negotiate with Tatsuo.”
Apparently that’s the garbage that police are taught, and it appears that Tony never thought to ask whether it’s biblical or not. If an officer walks up to someone, he can make up something about disturbing the peace (which Tony later acknowledges is well-known as a catch-all accusation) and then the cop’s victim is “lawfully” (U.S. law–not God’s law) subject to all kinds of arbitrary orders and searches.
I have a question: What does Tatsuo’s name and address have to do with whether he was disturbing the peace?
As far as Tony is concerned, there is no room for disobeying a man-god wearing a badge. You must submit, regardless of whether the accusations have any basis in reality.
After this, the officer says that Tatsuo isn’t under arrest, but he wants to search him for weapons.
Tony says,
“The moment Tatsuo refused to comply with the officer’s lawful orders to turn around and place his hands over his head…he was subject to arrest. The officer, at that moment, could use whatever amount of force he deemed both reasonable and necessary to overcome Tatsuo’s resistance.”
“The way Tatsuo locked up his body and clenched his hands together, which are behaviors that are obvious to even the untrained eye watching the video, were aggressive acts, which could lead a reasonable officer to believe a physical altercation was imminent.”
To Tony, it’s obvious that Tatsuo resisting a cop having him put his hands over his head is an aggressive act. This is because Tony thinks the cop is a man-god who must be obeyed. Disobeying a man-god is justification for a “reasonable” officer to believe this is a prelude to fisticuffs. What tender egos they must have! The truth is Tatsuo wasn’t aggressive in any way whatsoever, and a child could see it.
Tony says,
“Even though Tatsuo was resisting, the officer shows commendable restraint by trying to deescalate the situation through conversation–explaining his “plan” to Tatsuo.”
Well, by golly, let’s pin a medal on the man-god’s chest. It doesn’t matter whether that cop is there for a valid reason, or whether his accusation is completely preposterous. He has sauntered on to the scene and has given his orders and the mere humans must humbly obey. He showed tremendous restraint in not blowing everyone away, right then and there.
Tony says,
“Tatsuo then refuses to spread his legs and resists, multiple times, the officer’s efforts to move his legs so he could safely conduct a search of Tatsuo’s person, incident to a lawful arrest.”
First of all, at 4:10 in the video, after the cop tries to move Tatsuo’s legs, he says that Tatsuo isn’t under arrest, but being detained. Second, Tony will later acknowledge, and explain that Tatsuo wasn’t disturbing the peace. So where is the lawful arrest? Tony must be saying that it’s lawful to be arrested solely for disobeying a cop. That is un-American, and much more importantly unbiblical.
Where in the Bible are civil magistrates given the right to search people to see if they have weapons? They’re so special that they can only talk to people who have no weapons? They certainly are a timid bunch.
Tony says,
“Then, Tatsuo and his friends begin to make a scene by shouting. Any officer–any reasonable officer–would experience myriad of emotions as a result of recognizing he or she was in real and present danger…I cannot get into the officer’s head to ascertain to what degree he was in fear for his safety.”
At this point, it crossed my mind that Tony was making all of this up as a joke. This is the most preposterous thing I’ve read in some time. Tony thinks that reasonable officers experience a myriad of emotions when they hear shouting. Really? If shouting can upset someone, I’d think they must be an emotionally tender person.
But, what exactly is it that Tony calls shouting that he thinks might cause the officer to suffer fear and a virtual panoply of emotion? Are they cussing the cop out? Are they referring to him as various cuts of pork? Are they threatening him? No. They raise their voices to say, “Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness sake”, “Hallelujah!”, “Thank you Lord Jesus”. Tony actually says that such words could strike fear in the heart of a reasonable officer. I’m sure his life flashed before his eyes!
No wonder Tony isn’t a pentecostal where they shout such things in church. He would probably wilt in fear.
Maybe if these cops are so sensitive, emotional and fearful they could find a more suitable line of work. But, I imagine it would be hard for them to give up the rush of a good power trip that comes from knowing that you have the ability to lock up everyone who doesn’t hang on your every word.
Tony says,
“Tatsuo then foolishly asks his friend with the camera to follow him, now putting his friend in potential danger and maybe even making him subject to arrest.”
“For reasons of officer safety, the officer’s order to Tatsuo’s friend not to follow him was reasonable and appropriate, considering the circumstances. The officer even told Tatsuo’s friend, “You’re violating my officer safety!” But foolishly, the person behind the camera argues with the officer.”
Just when you think Tony couldn’t get any more ridiculous, he starts calling Tatsuo and his friends fools. These people aren’t crackheads, gang bangers or bikers, (as if that would be justification for the tyrannical behavior of this cop). They’re Christians. But this cop is afraid to have a Christian with a video camera walking behind him. It is a violation of his officer safety. He is a god walking among us and his safety takes precedence over any American’s right to walk through a parking lot, right?
Not only that, but Tony thinks Tatsuo is a fool for asking his friend to follow. According to Tony, only through the mind of a fool could a thought of someone freely walking across a strip mall parking lot cross. And Tatsuo isn’t the only one behaving foolishly. The cameraman also foolishly dares to question the orders of this man-god. I’m surprised the cop didn’t obliterate the petulant cameraman where he stood for daring to question a government official of the almighty state of California. One day that foolish man will run out of mercy and receive his full cup of wrath.
Tony says,
“While I do not believe Tatsuo was in violation of California Penal Code section 415 (disturbing the peace), I also do not believe Tatsuo was persecuted for his faith. I believe he simply suffered the consequences for his unlawful behavior. And, sadly, that same behavior brought a reproach upon Christ and His gospel.”
This is an amazing paragraph. Tony doesn’t believe that Tatsuo broke a law, but believes that he suffered the consequences for his unlawful behavior. Tatsuo’s only unlawful behavior, according to Tony, was disobeying the arbitrary, unjust orders of a government employee. Hello? I wish every Christian went out and disobeyed at least one arbitrary, unjust order every day. The world would be a better place.
Tony then goes on to explain how the officer was mistaken about pretty much everything he said about sound amplification, loud preaching and disturbing the peace.
At this point, Tony, like an unending number of American Christians, twists Romans 13 into a pretzel to teach that Christians must blindly obey the arbitrary orders of a cop. Tatsuo took pains to obey the law as written, but this isn’t enough. Tony accuses him of sin for disobeying a cop’s arbitrary and unjust orders!
I’ve been faced with this situation in the past, and I handled it differently than Tatsuo. I think that there is little justice in the American justice system and to put one’s life into the hands of a wicked judge is something I want to avoid. However, I certainly don’t think that what Tatsuo did was a sin. We are to stand for righteousness, and resist tyranny. If that’s the way Tatsuo wants to do it, then God bless him.
I have searched and searched for what has come of Tatsuo and this case. I can’t find anything on it, and he keeps a very low profile; he has no website, Facebook or Twitter that I can find. I hope that this is an indication that the charges were dropped. Another possibility is that Tatsuo was never actually arrested.
I can see cops thinking that they’re gods and their orders must be obeyed. I can see government passing laws that give such favors to their collection agents. What I can’t see is a Christian like Tony actually defending this wicked system, or saying that Tatsuo is sinning when he resists.
As we bemoan the pitiful condition of our country and our eroding liberties, we have Christian men like Tony to thank. Christians are supposed to be salt and light–to preserve society–maintain godliness and truth. Truth leads to freedom (John 8:32). When Christians warp Romans 13 to defend tyrants, they’ve abandoned the truth, and they might as well just beg for more tyranny.
Whose law you obey reveals who your god is. If you dutifully obey the laws of the state, even when the laws of the state and the law of God contradict each other, then the state is your god.
Tony is wrong, and his article is reprehensible. We need to fear God–not men.
Working for the Secession of Fremont County from the Union
